Southland Blues June 1998 JOHNNY WINTER - LIVE IN NYC '97 By Jon Pepper This is yet another great live document of Johnny Winter's talent. This blazing hot live performance, recorded at the Bottom Line in NYC, is just the ticket for both confirmed fans and people not yet familiar with Winter and his guitar. This album contains all cover tunes, which is typical of Winter's live shows, but they are covers that Winter has claimed as his own. He takes these tunes, some of which like "The Sky is Crying and "Got My Mojo Working" are old standards, and imprints his own unique playing style on them. The back up band is the band that Winter has worked with for a long time and they know his ins and outs very well. Both Mark Epstein on bass and Tom Compton on drums are very well suited to this set. The highlight of the whole album is "Johnny Guitar", Winter's theme song that was adapted from the late Johnny "Guitar" Watson. This song is the song that shows Winters' real feelings about his instrument and his music. This is a very lovingly crafted album and deserves a place in most record collections. Unless you absolutely hate electric guitar, and if you do why are you listening to the blues, don't buy this album, but anyone else should run out and purchase a copy.